DEAR MISS MANNERS: I work in a middle management position in a company that employs between 2,000 and 3,000 employees. Employees cannot receive calls while on duty unless it is an emergency. However, we will take messages.

Frequently, I receive calls informing me "Please hold the line for an important call." When a live person does come on the line it is always to inquire if an employee of my department is there. The company responsible for making the call always declines to leave a message.

I have been told that these are credit card company collection departments calling about late or missed payments. This really does not concern me in any way and is a valid reason to want to contact someone. But I am incensed by the conduct of placing a call and then essentially putting the answering party on hold! I am not the one making a request; I am the one answering a request, and then I am being treated rudely for my trouble.

I have seen no choice but to start hanging up on any recorded spiel that greets me when I answer the phone. I would like your support in this matter if you deem it appropriate and also the support of your readers. Maybe this practice will be abolished if the companies that employ it can no longer contact a person who will politely answer the phone willing to help, only to be put on hold for their convenience.

GENTLE READER: You have Miss Manners' blessing. People who are not ready to talk on the telephone should refrain from making telephone calls. The only exception she can imagine is if the caller is so overwhelmingly important that it is tactful to supply time for the receiver of the call to shout out, "I can't believe it! The Dalai Lama is calling me!"

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I have several nieces and nephews, and each time they graduated from high school and college and later married, I sent a lovely card and gift. I truly was proud of them and wished them well -- no extortion was involved.

When my son graduated from high school, some sent cards and a present: one sent a card, two sent nothing. This May, he graduates from a military academy and my daughter graduates a week later from high school. I felt very badly for my son when relatives did not acknowledge his accomplishments and congratulate him. I am afraid that it is going to happen again, to both of them.

I feel justifiably peeved and hurt about the actions of some of my relatives. I know that they know better and were raised to be gracious and sensitive. I also feel abused and taken advantage of as if they were saying, "We got ours, but yours get none!" What does one do in this instance?

GENTLE READER: Do? Are you thinking of something in the way of antagonizing your relatives and embarrassing your children by demanding issuing reprimands and making demands?

Miss Manners appreciates the desire of parents to make the world be good to their children, but she is afraid that they cannot step outside the bounds of politeness to do so. Retaliating, or even allowing your children to see your disappointment, will only make them feel pitiful, and you seem to be someone whose affection was offered only as an investment.

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: I think some in our family don't know dress etiquette. I told my family members that one should not wear white when there is an R in the month. They doubt my knowledge. Do you?

GENTLE READER: For a moment there she did, Miss Manners must confess.

"Oysters!" she felt like calling out. "You poor soul, you've mistaken your clothes for oysters."

This apparently nonsensical lament refers to the instruction (not issued from the realm of etiquette) that oysters should be eaten only in months that have the letter R in their names, namely September through April. The season for the ban on wearing white shoes (not on anything white; for example, it does not apply to shirts or teeth) is Memorial Day through Labor Day.

She soon realized, however, that the two formulae are pretty close. We're talking about less than a month's difference. If Miss Manners were one to compromise, she would suggest splitting the difference, but unfortunately, she is not.

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am a high school senior with several questions about announcements and thank-you notes. Who exactly do announcements go to -- all relatives and friends or just those who do not live nearby? Also, I was wondering how I could personalize thank-you notes, perhaps with senior pictures?

GENTLE READER: Miss Manners does not generally recommend applying logic to etiquette problems -- so much of it is simply custom that it would be like studying history by working out what you think should have happened.

However, logic would be useful here. You might ask yourself: What is the purpose of a graduation announcement?

The correct answer is to inform people who would be pleased to hear about the graduation. Everybody who put down that the purpose is to inform people that a present is due gets a blank diploma.

Some of your relatives and friends already know of the event, so you need not announce it to them. Some people who do not know might be distant enough not to be especially interested, so you wouldn't want to announce it to them.

By this process of elimination, the people to whom to send announcements would be those who you could reasonably assume would care but may not know and perhaps some who already know, but care so much that they would treasure your announcement as a souvenir of your achievement.

This is basic to what you call "personalizing" -- tailoring what you send to the recipient, more than merely showcasing yourself to everyone whose address you happen to have. It is especially required in letters of thanks. By all means, send a picture of yourself to anyone you think would enjoy receiving one. But, as these letters must be individually written, each geared to the addressee and expressing gratitude for the particular present that person sent, they cannot help being personalized.

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DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am visibly pregnant, and friends, family and strangers have been patting my stomach or, worse, resting their hands there. When I was introduced to my husband's friend, she rested the palm of her hand on my stomach while we were talking. Continuing to talk and smile, I gently but firmly removed her hand from my stomach.

I did note that she looked surprised, but I didn't think any more of it. Later in the evening, she asked my husband if I was angry or unhappy.

Since I apparently didn't handle the situation correctly, I would like to know what I should do in future such situations.

GENTLE READER: What makes you think you didn't handle the situation correctly? You removed the offending hand and, without being unpleasant, got across to the lady the idea that she had done something wrong. The only thing remaining is to continue being friendly, so you do not give the impression that this one transgression was fatal to your friendship.

Miss Manners hopes you are not going to be one of those mothers who never gets around to teaching right from wrong because she wants to avoid making the child feel guilty, even when he is.

Your technique can be applied to anyone else who needs to be told not to go around handling people's stomachs. If you wish to be kinder, you can tell them that you will be glad to let them hold the baby if they will be kind enough to wait until it is born.

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